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On evil by Terry Eagletonhttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/15/on-evil-by-terry-eagleton/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/15/on-evil-by-terry-eagleton/#respondFri, 15 Feb 2013 11:35:17 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=54]]>In popular discourse, Evil is unintelligible. The less intelligible an act is the more evil the act becomes. This accounts for the common-sense notion in which evil has come to mean ‘without a cause’. The contradiction in our current usage is that we then proceed to explain the unintelligible. The explanation often rests on something that is actually beyond the control of the actor: i.e., they *are* evil rather than what they have done is an evil act. When such discourses are used it is often in an effort to debunk the connection between environment (i.e., poverty, abuse, etc.) and replace it with another cause (i.e., character). In this way we throw out one cause only to replace by another more mysterious cause located in the opacity of the self.

One the fallacies that plagues this type of argument is that merely having a reason for why someone committed a violent crime, for example, does not mean that the reason is sufficient nor than it justifies the action. A reason does not make the action rational.

Eagleton, then, wants to resist both the idea that human actions are explicable and therefore cannot be evil and/or the view that human actions are radically inexplicable and therefore resist any meaningful discussion.

One of the popular critiques of divine virtue is this: if a person cannot choose to be virtuous then his virtue should not be admired anymore than ‘the size of his ears’. Most people are reluctant to ascribe this kind of determinism to our actions but this does not mean that we must therefore accept a deep individualism. In this sense, also, there is no blame in *being* evil. There is, as Eagleton argues, no ‘absolute distinction between being influenced and being free’. Influence, pressure, or force must be interpreted and therefore responding to influence is, at least in part, a creative effort. Responsibility is to relate to influences in a particular way and to recognise that the way in which we position ourselves in relation to a particular set of influences is a creative act (a choice, to some extent). If we follow this type of thinking onward we can observe that human beings possess a degree of autonomy but that this embedded in a wide and deeper dependence on others. Evil, then, is neither wholly chosen nor wholly beyond the control of the person.

For Eagleton, what is evil is the attempt to denies this mutuality. Pure autonomy is the dream of evil and is ‘metaphysical’. Rather than evil being a specific set of actions it is a form of relationality to being, i.e., the desire to annihilate being.

Is evil inborn? In one sense, yes, through original sin. As described by Eagleton, the doctrine of original sin is being innocently implicated in wrongdoing. Original sin is about being born and not whether you are saint or a sinner. It is original sin which makes the notion of autonomy a myth. This reproduction of the toxicity of sin can only even be broken by forgiveness.

Evil is destructive because it is the antithesis of God’s gift of creation. At the same time, evil is parasitic. It leeches off of life in order to fill the emptiness that rests within each of us. This emptiness is key because it those who represent non-being (i.e., they are an ontological threat) are those who drive you to mass-murder. The holocaust was not merely about Jews but also gays, lesbians, and the infirm. Evil then is a violence toward other beings as a means of assuaging the pain of the non-being which exists inside ourselves.

Evil is ‘amorphous and denies difference’ and often appears to have no purpose. Evil does not change and is boringly unremittingly the same. This is why hell is said to be for eternity. Evil is an example of pure disinterestedness. Evil is austere but dissolute; it both undervalues and overvalues the self. Perhaps one of Eagleton’s most memorable description of evil is where he describes it as a kind of cosmic sulking: ‘it rages most violently against those who threaten to snatch away its unbearable wretchedness’. Here Kierkegaard’s description of the tenacity with which we hold onto our own sinfulness is apropos. The evil want God to be dead because they want to reign as an individual sovereign of the space His nothingness leaves behind.

In contrast to this disinterestedness, goodness, like Gerard Manley Hopkins suggest, ‘is in love with the dappled unfinished nature of things’. Process and newness are part of the giftedness of life. Goodness is not a willingness to endure evil, as if torture were really for our own good, nor is goodness a willingness to see the bigger picture; rather it is both a scathing critique of the violence and oppression in the world coupled with a profound and unshakeable hope that we are capable of better. That we as humans have not yet moved beyond the point of being irredeemable. This hope, in Eagleton, is based on the belief that we (humanity) are not at our best when we live in circumstances of great oppression and hurt. Moreover, we are certainly not at our best when we experience a profound lack of material well-being.

Here then, is where Eagleton finds some hope in the face of the rare but no less real cases of Evil.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/15/on-evil-by-terry-eagleton/feed/0aaronreevesThe Unsettling of America by Wendell Berryhttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/07/the-unsettling-of-america-by-wendell-berry/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/07/the-unsettling-of-america-by-wendell-berry/#respondThu, 07 Feb 2013 11:35:17 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=49]]>The Unsettling of America is still, despite being quite dated, an important call to practice an ethic of kindly care in our interaction with the earth. Yet, as Berry argues, this ethic is profoundly difficult to realise because of the fractured quality of our identity and also our relationships with each other and the environment.

While earlier chapters work to layout the assumptions that drive the analysis in the latter parts of the book, I found these the most engaging and persuasive components. He seems at his most forceful when he allows the self-evident nature of the conclusions to stand on their own. However, his incisive critique of agribusiness and the agricultural policy of the United States still resonates, even if matters have changed somewhat.

Both our exploitative heritage and also the rapidity with which the industrial revolution brought change to our society are disconcerting for Berry. Although efficiency has always been the standard of the exploiter, the extent of this efficiency-driven organization of social life has been expanding greatly during the last century. The nurturer, those with an ethic of care and a goal of health, find their world is increasingly diminished by the encroachment of institutions and organizations. Households, place, and community are slowly eroded in an effort to serve corporations. It is at this interface that we observe the ethic of exploitation most starkly, where the contest between community and organization is fought out. One of the hallmarks of this exploitative efficiency is a lack of awareness of the uses of energy. We are unable to restrain ourselves and this lack of restraint draws into itself an insatiable desire to consume greater and greater quantities. This lack of restraint is predicated on an increasingly distant relationship from the land and from each other. Because there is no common bond which ties us to each other and to particular place we allow our desires to use up with little thought and we fail to exercise an ethic of care.

And yet, Berry recognises that to live undestructively in our current economy requires more than one person can do because the system itself is radically opposed to this ethic of care. One of the symptoms of this opposition is a reliance on specialists. This reliance disintegrates and fragments the various functions of our character and facilitates the sequestration of the land. Because we can rely on others we are able to have our attention constantly diverted toward money-mkaing and entertaining ourselves. At the same time, this specialization allows us to view the world as surrounding us, as external or other to us, rather than understanding our mutual interdependence. In this environment Berry advocates responsible consumption which would refuse to purchase poor products, things we do not need and would try to reduce our wants. In this regard his call is similar to one of Lowell Bennion’s maxims. “Learn to keep your wants simple and refuse to be controlled by the likes and dislikes of others.” For Berry, organizations will never be an effective corrective. They may promote a kind of forbearance toward the land but only a rigorous and sustained mutuality will foster this ethic of care.

One of the most memorable lines from Berry’s book comes from a letter he received. The author observes that he comes from a community where “The sin is not trespassing on anothers land but letting the apples go to waste.”. The issue here, according to Berry, is not whether we use but rather how we use. In short, I see this as one the most profound components of Berry’s argument. He wants to propose ways in which we can rethink our consumption because it is intimately tied to our use of the land. If we fail to check our consumption then we not only provide the conditions for the exploitation of other human beings but also for the ravishing of the earth.

He is aware of and willing to affirm the pristine condition of the Christian creation and suggest that this vision should pull on us. That it should be a call to care for the earth in order to restore the condition that was once lost. This pristine earth is not wholly cultivated and trimmed but it also contains wilderness: areas of land left to grow as they please. For Berry this disposition toward the land cultivates humility. By allowing it to grow we relinquish or at least recognise that ours is not to determine or control the life of all things. By contrast, agribusiness seeks to produce and consume as much as possible from the land. Usually this is most concerned with the production of profit and this impulse, coupled with specialization, undermine the principles of humility that are cultivated through a kindly care of land which involves diversity, crop rotation, husbandry.

This distance from the land is also a product of the absence of markets for minor produce. Smallholders find it difficult to find places to sell their excess and local people also do not share and distribute what they are not going to use. The small land holders have been systematically undermined by the sanitation movement because this often require purchasing materials and equipment that are too expensive. Hence the motto, which originated from Ezra Benson, ‘get big or get out!’.

This distance also ignores that food is a cultural product, it is not merely the consequence of technological production. In fact this type of production (which is again linked with specialization) undermines the culture of work that attends to food production. A farmer does not end when the clock tells them too but rather when the job has been performed well. This fragmentation of mind that Berry discusses is also evident in the attitude toward technology when we can introduce to new technologies to land without thinking about their consequences for the earth or the communities who use them.

Animals do not tend to foul in their own nests and yet what we think our nest is and where it is are questions of vital importance. If technology is to effect the land and the communities that use them then our lack of care suggests that we do not consider those places or peoples as part of our places and peoples. Transportation can separate us from place because when we do not live where we work we do not care about the effects of our work on the place. At the same time our desire to consume (not just the adequate or even the excellent) the new has an impact on those communities that must constantly be supplying those new products. Our consumption has become separate from the place of production.

‘Conviviality is healing’. For Berry, community is place where we can heal the earth and also heal this fragmentary mind that has come to dominate our culture. This fragmentary mind extends to the body as well. In our Christian culture, we have the absurd desire to be resurrected while we despise the body. Our loathing of the body is in part manifest through our wasting of the land for how we live in agriculture is also how we live in the flesh. This marginalisation of the body has been driven by our reduced use for them. As our work required less of us physically and as it separate the spaces of work, leisure, and home, we find an increasing sense that the concerns of those who occupy those separate spheres become more alien to those who do not inhabit them. That is, as men have frequently moved away from the home to places of work their concerns do not reflect the concerns of the woman who is left in the home. This fragmentation of space has led to an increasing divide between the sexes. Moreover, as technological production entered the household the work of the home became more boring. Because conviviality is healing, a sexual division of this kind can be a wound.

Berry’s book establishes an intuitive and experiential response to the fragmentation of our society. This distance between ourselves and the land, our families, communities, and other human beings facilitates a form of consumption that can be at worst exploitative and destructive, and at best wasteful and painful.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2013/02/07/the-unsettling-of-america-by-wendell-berry/feed/0aaronreevesThe Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claibornehttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/the-irresistible-revolution-by-shane-claiborne/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/the-irresistible-revolution-by-shane-claiborne/#respondFri, 18 Mar 2011 17:27:27 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=46]]>For a committed, institutional Christian there is something deeply unnerving about Shane Claiborne’s ‘Irresistible Revolution’. Not only does Claiborne offer a call to sever our attachment to the insularity of faith – and thereby radically reconfigures our conception of community – but it also seeks to destabilise the security of faith by opening up questions about our reading of the life of Jesus.

Community recurs throughout the book, though each representation is taken as one facet of the ‘The Simple Way’. The Christian community is one that is situated among the poor in an effort to collapse the boundaries which divide God’s children. Once these boundaries begin to collapse Claiborne envisions economic redistribution and interpersonal reconfiguration inexorably following. In this view repentance becomes a process by which people can transcend(?) the divisions between people. This transcendence is not necessarily metaphysical but interpersonal; it is the ability to see people and our surroundings in a (new) way which builds mutual trust and respect.

As I read the various accounts of collapsing these barriers I frequently considered the extent to which this change can be transient. I wondered what happened to those groups of people who were involved in protecting the homeless or those who spent their summer in Calcutta with Mother Teresa. Is it possible to consistently remove those barriers if you not are permanent among the poor? I reflect upon Christian Missionaries who served in Africa and who have struggled to readjust to the wealth of the West upon the completion of their proselyting. And yet, once they have adjusted they seem to forget the poverty and the suffering, and new concerns take over. Although ‘Calcuttas can be found everywhere’ it must be increasing difficult to find them if we leave the situation of our first awakening.

What also struck me about this book was the evidence that there was some scholarship behind Claiborne’s position but that there was also a strong sense in which he had used this selectively. The author(s) of John’s Gospel and also the epistles, for example, have a very different vision of community than the one Claiborne imagines. For these early Christians, the practice of brotherly love and economic redistribution was directed only toward those in the community. This does not detract for Claiborne’s larger point except to say that it is probably not wise to present his vision of the Christian community as the original, or earliest, message of Christ’s life. This type of apologetics will probably cause some to become distrustful of this hermeneutic.

The potential tragedy here is that the questions Claiborne raises concerning the import of Jesus’ ministry are provocative and worthy of consideration. His theological position is not unique (cf. Dominic Crossan) and yet his attempt to fully live this model of Christian revolution is. The attempt to actualise, and not just to reimagine, Christ’s revolutionary ministry needs to be considered in more depth especially because it is radically different from what many Christians currently believe and practice. Such reconsideration will serve only to draw us further into contemplative discipleship.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/the-irresistible-revolution-by-shane-claiborne/feed/0aaronreevesRocks of Ages by Stephen Jay Gouldhttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/26/rocks-of-ages-by-stephen-jay-gould/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/26/rocks-of-ages-by-stephen-jay-gould/#respondWed, 26 Jan 2011 17:37:35 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=43]]>Gould’s book is enlightening and generous; and which has certainly been influential in recent discussions of science and religion. Despite Dawkins incredulity, Gould’s position does possess a certain parsimony and beauty. Moreover, those Mormons familiar with Lowell Bennion will feel a sense of déjà vu while reading Gould’s monograph. These issues aside, I want to explore in some detail the ways in which the NOMA push against each other, for as Gould argues ‘if some contradiction seems to emerge between a well-validated scientific result and a conventional reading of scripture, then we had better reconsider our exegesis, for the natural world does not lie’ (p. 21).

The problem I sense in this view is the ability to separate these two magisteria completely; primarily because of something implied in what Gould notes here. This concerns the way in which the questions which each discipline raises are interrelated with the questions and answers obtained in the opposing magisteria. Science, through studying nature, inevitably (especially if we take it seriously) raises specific questions for Religion about the nature of God and Man in the universe. Gould emphatically denies miracles, ‘operationally defined as a unique and temporary suspension of natural law to reorder the facts of nature by divine fiat’ (p. 85). It is not so much that I find this idea problematic but rather this position raises very deep and specific problems for certain varieties of Christianity (as one form of religion).

Resurrection, for example, conceived in the Mormon tradition is a belief that upon death the spirit becomes separated from the body and that at some future point, as demonstrated by Jesus, God will re-embody those spirits. Though it is possible that resurrection is part of some enigmatic natural law it is rather more likely that this must be considered as a miracle. The issue here is that certain moral and ethical questions are, for Mormons, based upon this theological premise. To then argue that these magisteria are non-overlapping seems to neglect the radical implications that these scientific assumptions (and subsequent questions) have upon Religion.

Moreover, one potentially negative reading of Gould’s position is that the realm of the Religious magisteria is minimal. This is not, perhaps, what Gould intends and yet the increasing secularisation of Western Europe (cf. Bruce) which must be contrasted with the increasing religiosity in many parts of the world suggest that the relations between the magisteria is not determined by some a priori assumption about the relations between ethical and scientific questions. Rather, these processes are embedded in a variety of other social contexts.

In short, though Gould’s book captures a provocative resolution to the debates between science and religion he seems to sidestep the ways in which these magisteria are constructed and influence one another.

The intimacy of shared pain is a recurring theme through ‘Room’. Similar life experiences create rich and ennobling connections with people, but our different responses to painful experience inevitably drag others through our own recounting or re-living of an event. ‘Room’ asks question about how we respond to suffering in the context of other people who we care about.

Ma’s capacity to protect Jack from the horror of Room by creating a world within those walls revolts against her as they leave this narrow world and enter the expansiveness of Outside. In maintaining this narrow world for Jack Ma creates a cage for her son which she is all too willing to escape. Hence Jack narrow world makes him incapable of understanding Ma’s reluctance to keep items from Room or to re-visit it. His insistence forces her to relive experiences that she would sooner forget. Though Jack and Ma’s experiences and response are opposed throughout the Novel it is clear that a range of other moderate forms of shared suffering are implicated through these questions.

These are most clearly observed through Ma’s parents. Their divorce in response to Ma’s disappearance and Grandpa’ reluctance to even see Jack highlight the ways in which we must live our lives in the context of another’s suffering. Grandpa’s attempt to find closure for a daughter he believed to be dead caused such pain for Grandma (who never gave up hope) that she could no longer maintain their relationship.

Donoghue’s book has little to teach about how these experiences are to be handled. Jack’s insistence finds them moving through the house and garden back to the shed that had been her prison, but his world, for so many years. She is overwhelmed by the sensation and yet he is underwhelmed. Jack’s experience suggests that our pain is not as significant as we sometimes suppose. Must it be recognised and explored; need it be discussed and analysed, and who do we involve in such processes? Is it wise to explore such pain with those who have shared our experiences (but whose perspectives are probably incommensurable with our own) or are they best explored with certain empathic others who must endeavour to hear our suffering. Additionally how significant is the perpetrator in our pain? Should they be the ones to understand or change as a result of our narratives?

All of this is suggestive of the way that meaning is constructed through pain in our lives. Pain is embedded in relationships and it is difficult to fully interpret how we are to negotiate these webs of subjectivity. Is pain for us or for other people; and if it is for us is the management of our pain a necessary virtue that requires the sacrifice (or pain) of others on our behalf? In each of the characters in ‘Room’ there was an underlying sense that pain was self-centred rather than other-centred. This is most sharply focussed when the reporter asks why Ma did not give Jack away for adoption. The monstrosity of Ma’s decision to protect is focused through this dialogue, for she betrays a willingness to sacrifice her child to save herself. There is no doubt that we see them redeemed together but one wonders whether there redemption was not of a demonic sort; a dependent redemption that bound these souls together in a self-serving re-living of their pain.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/17/room-by-emma-donoghue/feed/0aaronreevesDavid O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism by Gregory Prince & Wm. Robert Wrighthttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/13/david-o-mckay-and-the-rise-of-modern-mormonism-by-gregory-prince-wm-robert-wright/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/13/david-o-mckay-and-the-rise-of-modern-mormonism-by-gregory-prince-wm-robert-wright/#respondThu, 13 Jan 2011 17:28:22 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=36]]>This is a singularly important book primarily because of the source material. It is based upon the diaries of McKay’s long-serving, private secretary, Clare Middlemiss, and therefore provides intimate and detailed access to minutes from the First Presidency meetings, private letters and other sensitive materials. The topically–themed chapters provide a vigorous, though at times repetitive, panorama of McKay’s 20 year service as Church President. A number of important themes could be discussed, and have been elsewhere, but I want to focus upon just one: dissonance among the brethren.

Though I am not an expert in Mormon History I have read many of the important monographs and articles in the field and was therefore aware of disagreements among the highest leaders of the Church. Yet, I was still surprised at the depth of ill-will, the stretching of counsel and, at times, the deception seen among the Apostolic leaders of the LDS Church. Evidently these are not perfect men and this book helped me see more clearly the times when they were petty or small-minded. These instances were not even sporadic; they seemed to be a frequent occurrence among the various quorums and I am left wondering how to reconcile notions of revelation, inspiration and unity with these accounts.

These records trouble conceptions of revelation which are linked with a specific vision of how councils work. Often a notion of councils which seeks idealistic models of co-operative discussion through loving participants has pervaded LDS ecclesiology. And yet it is evident that the participants, even at the very highest levels of the LDS Church, are far from the model of gentle and timid (i.e. loving) leaders. Thus not only is our conception of revelation mis-directed but also, it seems, is our view of the ethical implications of loving dialogue. At the very least, Maffly-Kipp’s sincerity box does provide one way that it becomes possible to observe how certain biases persist. These men are ordained to certain positions and sustained in those positions and it is possible that what they do can be divine, even if they did not pursue their goals with motives that were wholly pure.

Second, this book drives to the heart of another paradigm-shift. The narrative insists that this Church is a human-institution but with moments of divinity, rather than it being a divine-Church with moments of human weakness. Though I have accepted this premise for some time now; Prince’s biography helped me realise that I have some way to go before I fully accept that principle. In practice, therefore, the Church moves as most other organisations would if they were in similar situations. This view suggests that God is not involved in the daily management of the LDS Church but rather he speaks to his leaders at specific moments.

This paradigm-shift is associated with another insight which indicates that these weaknesses work together to form a revelatory process which works through collective error or that sin does not restrict the mechanism by which God moves through us. This fallen ecclesiology suggests that councils are a mechanism for the impure to still serve God and his people.

Prince’s book is a must-read text for anyone interested in the history of the LDS Church through the twentieth century.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2011/01/13/david-o-mckay-and-the-rise-of-modern-mormonism-by-gregory-prince-wm-robert-wright/feed/0aaronreevesThe Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblenhttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/30/the-theory-of-the-leisure-class-by-thorstein-veblen/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/30/the-theory-of-the-leisure-class-by-thorstein-veblen/#respondThu, 30 Dec 2010 17:37:49 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=33]]>Two primary reactions framed my cursory reading of Veblen’s seminal text. First, it was surprising how much of his thesis has become ‘accepted wisdom’ in the Leisure studies research literature. Second, it was unnerving how well he seems to have captured the field of Leisure studies without any empirical evidence, he seems to be the consummate ‘armchair sociologist’. However, both of these reactions are tied to the downfalls of the text.

That his conclusions have an initial similarity to the current field does not negate the additional dimensions that could have been elucidated through research data of some kind. There is never any sense, for example, for how the Leisure class are defined in empirical terms. Consequently, it is difficult to test Veblen’s thesis of the rising importance of Conspicuous consumption among the Leisure class without being to define who are in that class and who are not (even in a fuzzy way). This is not to say that statistical data is need to justify his claims, rather it is clear that very little data of any kind can be observed in his texts except for a few reflections on specific changes in education. Thus, although some of his reflections presciently capture the way in which leisure and consumption are enacted, his theoretical projections are rather weakly specified.

Veblen is famous for coining the phrase ‘Conspicuous Consumption’ and yet, like other memorable academic concepts, this phrase has been almost entirely emptied of the intended meaning. Consumption is conspicuous because it signifies prestige and, like Conspicuous Leisure, comes to demonstrate wealth; and it is this foundation upon wealth that is mildly troubling in Veblen’s account. Because the Leisure class is seemingly quite small, in comparison to the majority of people, Veblen’s account suffers from focussing upon the distinctions among that class. Instead he fails to trace the more significant (numerically) and problematic groups that have similar amounts of wealth and time but who conspicuously choose to consume particular products or to engage in specific forms of leisure. It is the distinctions within economic classes (in terms of wealth, not occupational position) that are significant in the UK today. Further, Veblen’s attempt to establish wealth as the root of both leisure and consumption while coupling it with honour or status requires a number of theoretical leaps that need to be established in greater detail. In this regard, therefore, it appears that careful reconsideration should be given to Veblen’s work in this area.

What is to be made of his conclusion that education is a form of training for participation in the Leisure class? Though research data indicates the importance of education upon Omnivorous behaviour and other types of ‘legitimate’ cultural practices there is very little concrete associations between attending a higher education establishment and the various types of leisure activities that are part of the ‘Leisure class’. Returning to a previously stated hypothesis on Conspicuous leisure versus consumption, how would you measure the increasing importance consumption? What indicators would suggest a shift either way? That leisure is becoming increasingly omnivorous could be a sign of either the decreased significance of leisure as a marker of distinction or it could be a sign that inter-genre distinctions are becoming more significant. The contemporary relevance of this account is weakened by such oversights.

Veblen’s text is certainly an enjoyable read, if you like late-Victorian academic prose, and his book has proved influential; yet its import has been superseded by more sophisticated and rigorous treatments of similar topics. It is canonical, and as such might be fading in its ability to provide acceptable answers but still has the capacity to provoke important questions.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/30/the-theory-of-the-leisure-class-by-thorstein-veblen/feed/0aaronreevesJoseph Smith, Jesus and Satanic Opposition: Atonement, Evil and the Mormon Vision by Douglas J. Davieshttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/23/joseph-smith-jesus-and-satanic-opposition-atonement-evil-and-the-mormon-vision-by-douglas-j-davies/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/23/joseph-smith-jesus-and-satanic-opposition-atonement-evil-and-the-mormon-vision-by-douglas-j-davies/#respondThu, 23 Dec 2010 14:17:14 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=31]]>Davies argues that Mormonism’s force as a religion is intelligible through a relational trinity (Jesus, Satan and Joseph Smith) evoked in three paradigmatic scenes: the Grand Council, Gethsemane and the Sacred Grove. This intelligibility makes Mormonism Plan of Salvation both accessible and appealing. Davies’ attempts to speak to and through a form of Mormonism which is now fading, or at least shifting, gives this text a liminal quality. He attributes some of the major shifts in LDS ecclesiology and theology to the reconfiguration of this trinity. And yet, despite being focussed upon Mormonism’s past, his book sensitises members of the Church, and interested observers, to those changes currently occurring.

For Davies one of the primary paradigm for the restoration is seeing early Mormonism as a form of sacred community, a form of Mormon-Israel. The formation of a chosen people was enacted through new and idiosyncratic scripture, various ritual elements (such as patriarchal blessings, endowments etc.) and the emergence of polygamy as a foundational kinship structure. Though Christian, these early Saints saw themselves as a breed apart and not really in competition with other Christian Churches nor did they seek their recognition. Here Davies wants to connect this Mormon-Israel with a larger, and perhaps more problematic contention, that LDS Christology was profoundly shaped by this early commitment[1].

Thinking Jehovah-as-Jesus, for Davies, is one of the singular theological innovations which emerged from this era. For LDS this ‘highlights’, according to Davies, ‘the “Mormon-Israel” theme and the father-son bond’ that underpins much of Mormonism’s creation narrative and the theology erected upon it (p. 70). However, as Davies implicitly recognises, qua Parley P. Pratt’s teaching that Jesus was the son of Jehovah-God, earliest conceptions of Jehovah and Jesus were not so uniformly delineated. Thus it is unclear how Davies reconciles the simultaneous de-emphasis of the “Mormon-Israel” and the (authoritative) rise of the Jehovah-as-Jesus formulation (cf. Thomas Alexander). To be sure, rather than focussing upon this theological innovation, Davies’ account would be bolstered by drawing out how the father-son bond (between God and his Son) took root in LDS theology and which elucidates the familial and relational aspects of Mormon soteriology.

For Davies, Mormonism is Binitarian; a view that seemingly draws heavily upon the Lectures on Faith. Thus ‘it is the Father and the Son who possess experience-developed bodies, with the Spirit effecting unanimity’ between them (p. 81). This unity is key because it frames Satan’s opposition (also from within the Father-son dyad) and becomes the focus of the rest of Davies book as he eloquently extends the implications of this idea for Mormon theology. Having only an amateur interest in Mormon theology I was surprised by Davies initial formulation of Mormon binitarianism. Despite an initial defensive reflex regarding the LoF it becomes apparent that this a prescient approach which raises a number of significant questions for how we experience Mormonism and how we consider our theology, questions which have not been seriously engaged (as far as I am currently aware) at this point (cf. Ostler) [2]. For example, that Davies believes the Holy Spirit is of primary importance to LDS religious experience but is almost insignificant in our formal theology indicates a gap (and a potential weakness) in our appreciation of the Godhead.

Satan’s opposition to the divine unanimity of Father and (righteous) Son provides a narrative framework for apostasy in Mormonism, according to Davies. This has been explored in cursory form in an earlier essay, but this book adds fleshes to the details of that argument and enables him to establish some of the elective affinities that made it possible. Personal character mattered when the message emerged from life narratives rather than other forms of authority. Consequently, Mormons invested heavily in those who were true to the cause. LDS theology and ecclesiology begins with, and is grounded in, apostasy; an insight perhaps previously under-appreciated (i.e. myself). Kristine Haglund illustratively recalls hearing some Mormons express frustration that PBS’ ‘The Mormons’ did not provide labels for the ‘anti-Mormons’ – correct me if I am wrong Kristine. Authority to speak is so fundamentally character based that we have erected an elaborate system of trust in an ecclesiology which advances those most faithful (read trustworthy and competent) to global leadership positions. Mormons imbue that process with divinity but consequently those outside it are often unintelligible or simply ignorable.

Davies book also implicitly explores questions concerning sources throughout his text. ‘Folk-theology’, as Davies calls it – borrowing from Givens, provides much of the material for this discussion; and yet I wonder whether this was an attempt to skirt the thorny issue of ‘authoritative doctrine’ in Mormonism. (Though this side-step might be more for Mormons than for him). The wide range of sources he cites are seemingly an attempt to excavate latent trends in LDS thinking that are outside of the unified message sometimes presented in more recent times. Thus, the liminality referred to earlier recurs with each unfamiliar citation. This book enacts diversity in Mormon theology even as it tries to elaborate it.

This is a fast-paced book that could probably have been twice as long and there was often a frustrating sense that he had more to say. Moreover, Davies skips across broad swaths of Mormon thought with a flexibility that was, at times, breathtaking. His prose is enjoyably concise and remarkably similar to this speaking style; which made reading this book like listening to an extended lecture on a challenging and exciting view of the ‘Mormon Vision’.

Notes:

In elaborating this view of Mormon-Israel Davies uses James Strang’s Millenial Kingdom as a foil for the Utah Church’s development of this theme. Davies argues that Strang’s movement extended these ideas further than did BY and his followers; but it would be great to hear John Hamer’s views on Davies chapter at some point.

Davies’ article in IJMS is a rare exception.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/23/joseph-smith-jesus-and-satanic-opposition-atonement-evil-and-the-mormon-vision-by-douglas-j-davies/feed/0aaronreevesPre-postcolonialism: Postcolonialism by Robert J. C. Younghttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/pre-postcolonialism-postcolonialism-by-robert-j-c-young/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/pre-postcolonialism-postcolonialism-by-robert-j-c-young/#respondTue, 21 Dec 2010 17:45:47 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=26]]>Not enough praise could be expressed for Oxford University Press’ ‘Very Short Introductions’. They provide excellent surveys of a field of study with just enough depth to sensitise the reader to the potential of a set of disciplinary tools. Unfortunately, praise for the series as a whole cannot be applied to every book. Robert J. C. Young’s addition to the series is one those texts that does what it promised but in a fashion which seems alien to its topic.

Young admits that Postcolonial theory has been attacked for using obscurantist prose and jargon-laden approaches to topics that are potentially of great political relevance. Consequently he proposes to provide a Postcolonialism-lite which engages the political, economic and social issues that contextualise postcolonial theory and which could serve as an illustration of the theory. In this case, the theory never really had a place in the text and, as such, there was a sense of the unspoken throughout the book. This was a frustrating read even though I am someone who is only mildly familiar with the topic in general and some of the primary texts.

A series of tantalising quotations floated across the page but without being substantively engaged in the Young’s narrative. Bhabha, Spivak and Said are all mentioned but without sustained discussed of their ideas in light of the historical examples Young claimed to be using to situate postcolonialism. This book rather seemed to suggest that a theory of postcolonialsim is needed but that what has been done so far has proved effective in only a limited sense. This may well be true but Young never made this claim explicit and I doubt that is his thinking.

However, despite these failures, there are some redeeming qualities. The insights into Fanon’s life, especially, the last section of the conclusion were useful and well-paced. Young’s use of Rai music as an example of Hybridity was productive, but only because I had already read ‘The Location of Culture’. Moreover, the discussion of translation and land did productively elaborate important ideas in this area.

The series is excellent but this book left much to be desired. Instead, purchase Loomba’s Colonialism/Postcolonialism in the ‘New Critical Idiom’ series.

]]>https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/pre-postcolonialism-postcolonialism-by-robert-j-c-young/feed/0aaronreevesThe Ecstasy of Sanctimony: The Human Stain by Philip Rothhttps://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/the-ecstasy-of-sanctimony-the-human-stain-by-philip-roth/
https://readingrituals.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/the-ecstasy-of-sanctimony-the-human-stain-by-philip-roth/#respondTue, 21 Dec 2010 17:22:00 +0000http://readingrituals.wordpress.com/?p=24]]>The third-part of Roth’s second Zuckerman trilogy (The Human Stain) was written in the context of America’s obsession with Clinton’s affair and considers Identity politics in American life. Roth uses Zuckerman’s portrayal of Coleman Silk’s racial deceit as a back-drop to explore ‘America’s oldest communal passion… its most treacherous and subversive pleasure: the ecstasy of sanctimony’ (p. 2).

This ecstasy is submerged in a gap, an excision of our memory. Like Toni Morrison in ‘The Bluest Eye’, Roth wants to elucidate the way that people wash themselves in the sins of another. Identity is the violent construction of our narrative. This is the (Human) stain that we leave in the lives of those whom we use to define ourselves. ‘There’s no other way to be… It’s in everyone. Indwelling. Inherent’ (p. 242). Yet, it is the joyful pursuit of this form of purity-through-sanctimony that is most appalling. We rejoice in purity obtained through the stain we leave on the other.

Silk’s relationship with the comparatively youthful and uneducated Faunia Farley, through this lens, becomes particularly provocative. They are equalised by their refusal to rejoice in this sanctimony; rather they seek to reveal their excised selves to each other, not what was excised but rather that they were fundamentally a gap, a blank, a lack. The pain, however, in their relationship emerged from the specific form of their connectedness; she could not escape the privilege of his suffering (p. 234). The size and nature of the excision in Farley was different, and perhaps, incommensurable with Silk’s. It was incommensurability that made their relationship passionate but also leading inexorably toward their deaths.

Here Roth underscores the inherent absence in a re-telling (playing upon his earlier ‘So I married a Communist’ and ‘American Pastoral’). It is an absence that we attempt to cover with the act of re-telling, it is like the gaps between the cords of wool in a knitted jumper. This loose weave is pried open in the final pages of the book as Zuckerman confronts whom he believes to be (and whom he has ‘re-told’ in the book in such a way as to inevitably conclude that he must be) the killer. These pages are Roth at his very best and yet the genius of this passage is not necessarily in the tension of the encounter (though it is there) rather it is in the ambiguity which becomes observable through the threads of Zuckerman’s re-telling. It is here, in the encounter with the other, the one we have stained, that we must learn to mourn the violence we have done to them.